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1LGIUM AND 
GREECE 



BY 



J. W. HEADLAM 






NEW YORK 
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS IN AMERICA FOR HODDER & STOUGHTON 
MCMXVII 



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Copies can be obtained from 

George H. Doran Company, 

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Price 5 cents 






BELGIUM AND GREECE 



IT is not unnatural that during the last few 
months articles have from time to time appeared 
in the papers of neutral countries drawing attention 
to the treatment of Greece by the Allies and suggest- 
ing that this shows how little regard need really be 
attached to their professions that they are actuated 
by the respect for the rights of small States, and that 
they are defending law and justice against force 
and violence. It is suggested that when these pro- 
fessions are put to the proof, Great Britain and her 
Allies act precisely as Germany has done; we talk 
of the rights which belong to the weak when Bel- 
gium and Serbia are overrun by the German armies, 
but when a small and weak State refuses to do our 
bidding, it becomes apparent that we are willing 
to commit exactly the same crimes that we have 
denounced in others. 

The argument is one that would appeal to simple 
and ingenious minds. Belgium was a neutral State 
and so was Greece. Belgium was a small State 
and so was Greece. The neutrality of Belgium was 
violated by the German Army, who claimed to use 



2 BELGIUM AND GREECE 

the territory as a road to France. The neutrality 
of Greece was violated by the armies of the Allies, 
who claimed to use the territory in order to transfer 
their armies to the seat of warfare between Serbia 
and Bulgaria. What more could be required? Is 
it not evident that the Allies are guilty of that very 
crime which they charge against the Germans? 

The argument may seem conclusive, and it would 
be conclusive were it not that it omits the cardinal 
elements on both sides. A promise, a treaty, a word 
of honour solemnly pledged. And, in truth, those 
who maintain that the conditions are similar, in the 
very fact that they do this, assent to the proposition 
that in international relations promises are empty 
words, treaties are scraps of paper, pledged honour 
is as a breath of air which flows hither and thither, 
purposeless, on the face of the earth. Belgium was 
neutral and Greece was neutral, but the neutrality 
of the two States was as different as black and white. 
For the neutrality of Belgium was the fulfilment 
of a solemn engagement, the neutrality of Greece 
was the violation of an engagement equally binding; 
if the one was a virtue, the other was a crime. 

There has been much talk of the neutrality of 
Belgium. Men have written long books about it. 
The whole question has been encumbered by learned 
disquisitions on international law and The Hague 
Conference. The pages of the most voluminous 
and the most worthless of professors have been 



BELGIUM AND GREECE 3 

ransacked to find arguments on one side or the 
other. All this is beside the point. To judge the 
question we require nothing but a firm grasp of 
those simple and universal rules of conduct which 
bind together old and young, learned and simple, 
civilised and barbarian. Had Grotius and Puffen- 
dorf and Bluntschli never lived, the issue would not 
be changed, and it would be much clearer. A 
definite and formal promise had been made by the 
five great Powers in Europe that Belgium should be 
permanently neutral. This meant, first, that they 
were debarred from going to war against Belgium, 
and, secondly, that in case of war against other 
States, they were debarred from using an alliance 
with Belgium, or using the resources of the country, 
or the territory of the country, in support of their 
armies. On this there has in fact never been the 
slightest shadow of doubt. 

The promise might have been wise or foolish ; it 
was open to any State to represent that it was one 
which under modern conditions could not be main- 
tained, to declare that she wished to be freed from 
it, and to summon a conference of the guaranteeing 
Powers in order to arrange for an abrogation of the 
treaty. But if this was to be done, it must be done 
in time of peace. For it was characteristic of the 
engagement that it only became effective when the 
state of war had in fact arisen; then it was too late 
to disown it. If two men fight a duel they fight on 



4 BELGIUM AND GREECE 

the agreed conventions ; it is open to them before 
the actual struggle begins to ask that these con- 
ditions and conventions should be changed ; it is 
not open to them without warning, when face to 
face with the adversary, to start the duel by a treach- 
erous and false stroke. 

So much for Belgium, but what of Greece? Here 
first, we note that there was no engagement on the 
part of any Power to respect the neutrality of 
Greece. According to the general principles of 
European relations, it was open to any State which 
had a serious cause of difference with Greece to 
make on her those demands which she required in 
her own interests, to embody them in an ultimatum, 
and, if necessary, to enforce them by war. Con- 
duct of this kind would be judged on the particular 
case; it might be justifiable, it might be reprehen- 
sible; all would depend upon the questions at issue 
and the cause of difference. When two Powers 
are at war, to present demands, and, if necessary, 
go to war with a third Power, is in itself in no way 
more contrary to ordinary political convention than 
is the original declaration of war. Much has been 
talked about the rights of neutrals which is quite 
beside the point. The state of neutrality is not a 
positive, but a negative one. It means only that at 
a particular moment the neutral State is not party 
to the conflict which is in progress. It may become 
one at any moment, either by its own action or by 



BELGIUM AND GREECE 5 

the action of either of the belligerents. Any such 
action should, of course, be well weighed and under- 
taken for serious and honourable objects. If these 
objects are right and sufficient, the entanglement of 
another State in war is not in itself something to 
be reproved, though it may be regretted. And there 
may be cases where the maintenance of neutrality 
is in itself a crime, just as the violation of neutrality 
in other cases may be a crime. 

Now, how did this matter stand with Greece? 
Here, again, everything is really of transparent sim- 
plicity. In the year 1912, after the first Balkan 
war, when a quarrel arose among the allies, a fresh 
war broke out between Bulgaria on the one hand 
and Greece and Serbia on the other. In this war 
Greece and Serbia were successful. As a result of 
their successes they added each to their dominions 
territories to which Bulgaria had laid claim. It 
could easily be foreseen that when opportunity arose 
Bulgaria would inevitably make every effort to 
recover some at least of the territory that she had 
lost. To guard against this danger a treaty of 
alliance was made between Greece and Serbia. The 
treaty has not been published and we do not know 
precisely either the date on which it was concluded 
or its specific terms. So much, however, is known, 
that each of the contracting States engaged to sup- 
port the other in arms in defence of its territory in 
the case that any attack was made upon it by Bui- 



6 BELGIUM AND GREECE 

garia. By this Serbia secured, as she hoped, the 
firm possession of Monastir and the surrounding 
districts, and Greece secured Salonika and Kavalla. 
The treaty was a reciprocal one. Had at any time 
Bulgaria, as she well might have, threatened Greece 
with war, Greece would at once have called for the 
help of her ally, and we cannot doubt that the 
appeal would have been made and the pledge re- 
deemed. But the circumstances arose that it was 
not Greece which called on the help of Serbia, but 
Serbia which called for the help of Greece. Bul- 
garia mobilised her forces, and it was shown by 
every indication that she proposed to throw them 
on the rear of the Serbian Army just at the moment 
when Serbia was fully occupied in defending her- 
self against the overwhelming numbers of the Aus- 
trian invasion. Never was there a time when one 
State could with so good a cause summon to her 
assistance a pledged ally. 

For, let it be noted, Greece was the only State 
by means of which the necessary help could be 
given. The Treaty of London, which in this matter 
had been confirmed by the Treaty of Bucharest, 
had denied to Serbia access to the sea. She was 
thereby shut off from free intercourse with the other 
States of Europe. She had great and powerful 
allies — Russia, France, Great Britain — but such was 
the unfortunate geographical position of the king- 
dom that scarcely a single soldier, much less an 



BELGIUM AND GREECE 7 

organised expedition, could find his way to the 
threatened territory, except over the soil of Greece. 
It was this condition against which the Serbian na- 
tion and the Serbian statesmen had struggled, and 
justly struggled, in the discussions which followed 
the first Balkan war, for they had seen quite clearly 
that a Serbia which had no access to the sea would 
be still a Serbia subject to the caprices or the ambi- 
tions of Austria. One safeguard alone there was, 
and that was the alliance with Greece, for the 
alliance with Greece opened up the single railway 
by which there was connection with the sea and a 
great port. 

And this brings us to a matter which is very per- 
tinent to the whole question. It is customary for 
German writers, in comparing the German action in 
Belgium and the Allied action in Greece, to assert 
that the Germans were under the domination of 
what they called "Not," or necessity. They were 
driven, so they declare, under the paramount re- 
quirements of defending their national existence, to 
acts which might, perhaps, be condemned. They 
suggest that there was no such requirement in the 
landing at Salonika. It was a contrast which, if 
they were wiser, they would not have suggested. As 
to the invasion of Belgium we know, and they 
themselves now know, that there was no necessity ; 
if it had been merely a question of a defence of the 
German frontier, that could have been carried 



8 BELGIUM AND GREECE 

through with equal ease on the line from Lim- 
bourg to Switzerland. But that which they mean 
by necessity was not the protection of Germany, but 
the crushing of France. It was an illustration of 
the German way of calling the annihilation of an 
enemy mere self-protection. 

What hypocrisy it is ! The invasion of Belgium 
was not a device suddenly adopted in a moment of 
justifiable panic; it was a plan long conceived, care- 
fully matured, worked out by the German General 
Staff, and it was because they had this plan that they 
ventured to defy Europe and appeal to arms in a 
matter which was easily capable of settlement by 
agreement. 

But how do matters stand with Serbia? Here 
there was a case which justifies the use of the word 
"necessity." Serbia was attacked on the north by 
the superior forces of the Austrian Army, on the 
east and the south by their Bulgarian allies. Against 
these superior forces she could not maintain her- 
self. She had as allies three of the greatest Pow- 
ers of the world, but their alliance was useless to 
her unless there could be established a free com- 
munication for ammunition and troops. But the 
persistent enmity of Austria had always refused 
Serbia access to the sea ; the small inland State was 
shut off from the outer world by high mountains and 
wild passes ; there was only one road by which aid 
could reach her, and that was from Salonika 



BELGIUM AND GREECE 9 

through Greek territory. If we look at the matter 
from the point of view of Serbia, this will at once 
show us that the Treaty with Greece was not an 
accidental and unimportant thing; it was in truth 
the very condition of her existence. Were the road 
through Greece which had thus been secured to her 
closed, she could look for nothing but the annihila- 
tion which has, in fact, fallen upon her. It is true 
that the necessity was not that of Russia or France 
or England, it was that of Serbia; we can under- 
stand that the Germans would not recognise that a 
small State opposed to themselves, which had for 
long been marked out for destruction, should be 
reckoned in the matter at all, but for the Allies there 
was a paramount and overwhelming necessity, that 
of doing all in their power for the salvation of 
Serbia. 

The application, therefore, was made by Serbia 
in the height of her peril, at the very crisis of her 
existence as an independent State, to her Greek 
ally. The application was made, and it was refused. 
It was, perhaps, the most dastardly refusal of which 
there is any record in history, a refusal sufficient 
to justify a demand that the nation which was 
guilty of it should be struck out of the society of 
civilised States. 

When the refusal was made it would have been 
open to Serbia to call for the help and countenance 
of Britain, France, and Russia, to lay before them 



10 BELGIUM AND GREECE 

the case, and to ask that, as allies, they should 
support her request with the strongest diplomatic 
representations, and that, in the case that the refusal 
was persisted in, they should declare war upon 
Greece, reduce the country to subjection, and treat 
the territory as that of an occupied and conquered 
adversary. Against this not a word could be said on 
the ground of convention or of law or of morality. 

It will perhaps have been better had they acted 
thus. What they did was something infinitely 
milder, and it showed their desire in every way to 
spare Greece the horrors of warfare. There are 
cases, and this perhaps is one, in which considera- 
tion becomes a blunder and leniency becomes a 
crime. All that they asked was that, while Greece 
herself might remain neutral, the armies of the 
Allies should be allowed to use the port of Salonika 
and the railway for the conveyance of troops to the 
assistance of the Serbians, who were now engaged 
in a hopeless struggle against overwhelming forces 
attacking them on three sides. 

This they asked, and in this Greece tacitly 
acquiesced. More than this they have never asked. 
They have not required from Greece that active co- 
operation to which they were entitled. The situa- 
tion which arose was indeed an unusual and an awk- 
ward one. A portion of Greek soil was used as a 
base by foreign Powers in a war against States with 
which Greece herself was at peace. But this situa- 



BELGIUM AND GREECE 11 

tion arose entirely from the first refusal of Greece 
to fulfil her obligations. And, given the existence 
of this situation, with what extraordinary considera- 
tion have the Allies handled it! For many months 
they left the full civil administration of Salonika in 
the hands of the Greek Government ; they did not 
even proclaim martial law and take the full control 
into their own hands until Greece had shown by 
numerous acts that she was working in secret agree- 
ment with Germany, Austria, and Bulgaria. Greek 
territory was being used (of this there is abundant 
proof) to provide supplies for the German and 
Austrian submarines ; Salonika was full of spies and 
there was constant communication with the Central 
Powers; it was seriously proposed to interfere with 
the communications of the Allies, if not by open 
warfare, at least by the encouragement of popular 
risings. Fort Rupel, one of the strongest fortifica- 
tions erected in modern times, holding an important 
strategical position and dominating the Valley of 
the Struma, was surrendered practically without 
resistance to the Germans ; a Greek army corps was 
handed over to them with all its provisions and 
munitions of warfare. Was it to be expected that 
the Allies would acquiesce in the continuation of 
such a state of things? What ground is there for 
complaint that at last — and, as many will be inclined 
to think, after undue procrastination — pressure was 



12 BELGIUM AND GREECE 

brought on the Greek Government and the Greek 
people by the method of a blockade? 

When the full account of these events is written, 
it will, I think, appear that never in the history of 
the world has a State been treated with such con- 
sideration, for it must always be remembered that, 
owing to her geographical position, Greece and her 
capital were entirely at the mercy of the Allies. It 
has been said that they tried to force Greece to join 
in the war. This is untrue. As we have seen, they 
would have been completely and absolutely justified 
in pursuing such a course. They did not ; from be- 
ginning to erd they have demanded nothing except 
the use of Macedonia for military purposes and 
honest neutrality on the part of Greece. 

What, in fact, we have in the case of Greece is 
not the ruthless abuse of force on the part of the 
Allies. It is quite the reverse — a small State pre- 
suming on the consideration which she knew that 
she would receive just because of her own weakness, 
and, trading on the long-established interest which 
France and England had shown her, using her 
position to violate her treaties and to commit acts 
of scarcely veiled hostility, on which no great Power 
would ever have ventured. 



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